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Tiscali for sale?
dronkula
23-01-2008
Hmm. If bought by someone who wants to invest in TV over IP, then good. However, I don't think CPW is that company. If they bought it, it would just be for the LLU side of the business rather than the extra services provided.

To be honest, probably the best companies to buy this would be either Virgin, to kick start their own 'Virgin TV over IP' plans, or Sky, to compete with Virgins service.

Quote:
“Tiscali chief plots sell-off
Succumbing to cheapskate fatigue
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/01...mpei_sell_off/

Tiscali customers and employees can look forward to more turmoil in the next two years. The Italian-owned group's boss Tommaso Pompei says he's expecting to sell up to rivals as it struggles to compete with richer players in the broadband market.”

Chris123
23-01-2008
Was just going to pop on here and say the exact same thing

.... great minds think alike!

http://www.pcpro.co.uk/news/159030/t...two-years.html

Can just see it now, just like the good old days of cable networks all being merged into one company and now the same with internet companies.

has taken me about 15 mins to post this post as it keeps telling me page can not be displayed!
Peter We
23-01-2008
Virgin?? are you joking? they are even worse than Tiscali.
Furnell
23-01-2008
Originally Posted by Peter We:
“Virgin?? are you joking? they are even worse than Tiscali.”

thats your opinion its not a fact
b.lever
23-01-2008
[quote=Peter We;21091119]Virgin?? are you joking? they are even worse than Tiscali.[

NO WAY .
Peter We
23-01-2008
Originally Posted by Furnell:
“thats your opinion its not a fact ”

My opinion is based on being a Tiscali TV customer and NTL customer. Sticking a new name on the same company doesn't change anything.

I mean, threads like 'Good speed this evening' in the Virgin forum, WTF??

I've never had anything less than 7.2Mb down 24/7 in the four years I've used HC/Tiscali. I've lost service an average on once a year for an couple of hours at most.

The two days outgoing email was down last week was the worst downtime I've ever received.
davidredge
23-01-2008
my money is on either virgin or orange.
So far Tiscali have unbundled exchanges to compete with virgin, so what exactly would virgin gain by purchasing tiscali? Not alot.
Orange... Its a strong possibility. In Europe Orange have tv services, but have limited plans in the UK. Makes sense.
Other than BT, who'd face a few questions if they made an offer, i can't think of any other operator looking at broadband tv.
fishywik
23-01-2008
Originally Posted by davidredge:
“Other than BT, who'd face a few questions if they made an offer, i can't think of any other operator looking at broadband tv.”

Err, maybe Sky springs to my mind
dronkula
24-01-2008
Originally Posted by davidredge:
“my money is on either virgin or orange.
So far Tiscali have unbundled exchanges to compete with virgin, so what exactly would virgin gain by purchasing tiscali? Not alot.
Orange... Its a strong possibility. In Europe Orange have tv services, but have limited plans in the UK. Makes sense.
Other than BT, who'd face a few questions if they made an offer, i can't think of any other operator looking at broadband tv.”


Ermm, because Tiscali have unbundled exchanges, which Virgin don't have - they're buying their LLU service 'wholesale' from Cable and Wireless, then I would say that Virgin would have a lot of gain by buying Tiscali.

So, on the net side of things, Virgin don't have a glowing reputation, but neither does Tiscali (just look at the bodge-job they've done this month with bandwidth throttling which actually broke Itunes for many customers!).

However, on the TV side of things, I don't think there will be any *new* companies interested anymore in running *linear* TV channels and taking on Sky and Virgin. The services from BT and the soon-to-be-launched-at-some-point-in-the-future Orange are both, I think, Freeview with extra VOD. If you want to keep your TV service, then you'd better hope either Sky or Virgin step in. And even with Sky I'm not sure if they would carry on running the linear channels either or whether they'll just switch to their own SkyAnytime service.
Zapomatic
24-01-2008
I think a buyer would keep and develop the linear side of things. Tiscali TV fills a niche for people who can't get cable and can't have Sky (eg. rental property, block of flats etc) and can't get Freeview.

In the last place I lived I got Homechoice because the building I lived in was wired up for cable. There was no true terrestrial feed, only the free analogue channels broadcast down this cable. The building couldn't be wired for Sky, and at the time NTL couldn't provide digital TV or broadband (a neglected ex-Videotron area).

Now that I've moved, despite being in a cabled area my actual street isn't cabled. Also it's a new-build flat so no Virgin cabling. We're wired up for Sky but the actual connection is in the wrong room, plus I like the on-demand content so I've gone for Tiscali. I can get a proper Freeview signal now, luckily, so the Tiscali+ box will be nice to have. BT Vision doesn't appeal because of the lack of actual channels, and also the reports I've read about the robustness of the software, streaming etc - at least with Tiscali on-demand content is totally seamless. Starts immediately, no buffering and you can fast-forward and skip to wherever you like instantly.
davidredge
24-01-2008
Originally Posted by fishywik:
“Err, maybe Sky springs to my mind”

As another poster pointed out, Sky are unlikely to see any value in linear TV services, and surely VOD can be done via their existing BB technology, with more cost effective upgrades.
Feed The Reaper
24-01-2008
Tommaso Pompei, CEO of Tiscali, has said he expects its broadband opeartions the UK and Italy, to be bought up by rivals in the next two years. Pompei said he did not see many opportunities for Tiscali to buy rivals, and therefore it was more likely that the company’s UK and Italian broadband operations would be sold.

However, he said the company was not for sale, adding that he was focused on executing its 2008 strategy to report a net profit for the first time in its 10-year existence. Europe has experienced a wave of consolidation deals between companies providing high-speed internet access in the past two years. Pompei predicted a second wave of consolidation in the coming two years. "We do expect to be part of this process," he told the Financial Times.

He said Tiscali had previously received expressions of interest in its UK operations, although no negotiations were taking place.


http://www.advanced-television.com/2...1_jan25.htm#h4
dronkula
24-01-2008
You've got to wonder about what's going through the CEO's mind here.

'Hey - we're not for sale! But we expect to be sold within the next 2 years'. From a business point of view, a staffing point of view and a customer point of view that's just bad.

From a business point of view - ok, so the-word-on-the-street is now that the company could be for sale so you'll start getting businesses looking at it. But, what he's also said is that he doesn't expect the company to last 2 years, so why buy it now at a premier when instead they can just wait 18 months and get it at a knock down price?

From a staffing point of view - who upsetting must it be for the staff at Tiscali to know that their own boss can't lead them forward anymore and that he expects to sell up and move on soon?

And from customers - buyouts hardly even happen smoothly. Why take the risk of joining Tiscali when by the end of your contract it might be owned by someone else who's stuggling to merge that network with their own?
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